


but they will carry on for us

by Austell



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: (not that it should need to be said), Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Fluff, Gen, Nonbinary Chara and Frisk, frisk is perspective character, they're all dreemurrs here!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-19
Updated: 2017-09-19
Packaged: 2018-12-31 11:52:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12131916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Austell/pseuds/Austell
Summary: collection of three fluffy ficlets about the dreemurr kids! they're pretty rough but i thought they'd go well together. i hope you enjoy!! ♥happy late anniversary!





	1. they're getting used to it.

**Author's Note:**

> this one was for [Aisu](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Aisu), who asked for something with Frisk and sunsets!

It takes a long time for Frisk to see what everyone else sees in the evening. They’ve always been slow on the uptake—they’re a little bit of a downer, especially when other people are excited. But they remember to smile and hold hands and sit in silence, anyway, as cold breezes sneak into the loose sleeves of their sweater, and as stars come out to watch distantly the disappearing sun.

Frisk thinks they must be bored, and thinks of the dirt path going down from the cliffside and back home, and thinks of the phone in their pocket. GPS enabled. They knead Asriel’s hand with their fingers and lean into his shoulder.

“You tired?” he asks.

They shake their head, hair rubbing into his fur, and mumble something meaningless that they immediately forget.

“All right.”

Asriel is perfectly still, perfectly rapt. He loves clear sunsets, the orange sky, the weird gold that it brings out on Frisk’s skin. Rainbows, sunsets, constellations. These are things that Asriel loves. Frisk is learning.

Something very, very cold touches their relaxed palm and they jump. Their yelp of surprise gets mixed up with Chara’s “Hey, goofuses!” and they fall over backwards. Asriel, statuesque, barely even reacts as Chara’s shrieking laughter echoes around them.

“I…” they begin, and then have to stop, doubling over on their bare knees. “I brought soft drinks—Frisk, make that sound again. Please.”

"I will eat you," Frisk says from the floor, knowing full well they're upside down to Chara.

“I don’t know what you said,” says Chara, crossing their legs and flopping down beside them.

"And you never will," Frisk responds tartly, before using their hands to push themself upright.

Chara snorts. They push the two cans of chilly soda in Asriel’s direction and settle in, stimming with their little twisty thing.

“Hey, Az,” they say. “Hey—hey, Az.”

“Mm?”

“Are you okay?”

Asriel thinks about this for a second, and then nods. “Yeah. ’M fine. Thanks.”

And Chara scoots closer, their hand gently touching Frisk’s, their palm sweaty from climbing the path; and Frisk links up with Asriel again, and wonders what Chara thinks of sunsets. They’re not actually sure, and having conversations is both easier and harder now that they’re separate.

The sunset passes like this—softly, hand in hand. And because it’s cold, they walk home tightly clustered in the dark, Chara’s breath loud in Frisk’s ear, Asriel complaining that they’re slow; and home is waiting for them with the smell of baking.

“Did you have fun watching the sunset, Frisk?” Toriel asks over dinner.

They nod unhesitatingly, their mouth full of dumpling.


	2. they're coming to terms with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one was for a friend on tumblr, who just wanted some fluff!

It’s another downpour.

Frisk stares out into what looks like a solid wall of rain, calmly fidgeting. The windows are open—to ventilate the house, Toriel says—and the cool, moist air and crashing of water on the muddy path outside are perfect for zoning out.

“When is it going to let up?” Asriel complains, sprawled out on the sofa next to them.

“…m'be to-morrow,” Frisk mumbles. “Th'forecast said.”

“It never _used_ to rain this much,” Asriel moans.

“It’s—it’s monsoon season,” Frisk reminds him.

“Enjoy it while it lasts, Az,” says Chara from the floor, their face entirely obscured by the cover of the horror anthology they’re reading, their bare legs splayed out on the tiles.

“Monsoon season sucks,” Asriel declares. “The surface sucks. I need to buy my chisps.”

“…I can. I can get them?” Frisk ventures, at exactly the same time as Chara says, “Pay me and I’ll do it.”

Asriel sits up sharply, the sofa springs squeaking in protest as he shakes his floppy ears off his face. “Wowie. Out in _that_?”

“I mean,” says Chara, waving a hand in the air so that it just reaches over the sofa cushions, “if you can afford it. I want two ice creams.”

“I-it’s just rain,” Frisk begins, signing the tiniest little raindrops they can.

“Don’t undercut my prices,” Chara warns them.

“I’m not making either of you go out in that,” Asriel says nervously. “It’s like really slippery, and what if you get hypothermia? No way. I’ll just wait until Mum gets home from the summit.”

“Well, all right.” Chara grips the edge of the sofa and lifts their head into view. “Do you wanna play some piano?”

Asriel blinks slowly, sliding down until his dangling feet touch the floor. “I… guess…?”

“What if I get everything ready first?”

“Oh, erm… yeah. Sorry.” Asriel slinks over to Frisk’s side, latching onto their arm, and then jerks as Chara tickles the sole of his foot. “Hey!”

“Beans touched: one,” Chara announces, and dashes over to the little upright piano Toriel has squeezed in beside the bookcase, as Asriel listlessly follows.

Frisk shuffles forward to pick up Chara’s book, which they’ve left spread out on the floor, the spine wedged open on their current page. It’s something about a man getting badly sunburned. They only skim the text before slipping Chara’s favourite bookmark inside and placing it on the coffee table.

Chara flips open the lid of the piano and runs their hand over the shiny keys. They’ve got sheaves and sheaves of pencilled sheet music scattered over the top, where Frisk can’t really see; and standing on tip-toe, they snatch down two pages. “I think we’ll start with these.”

Asriel leans over their shoulder to look. “Oh, I know this one. Just some of the chords are different, and it’s longer…” He sounds curious.

“It’s an _arrangement_ ,” Chara corrects him, offended. “This is your part. Listen, I’ve tried it out, we’ll sound great…”

As they squeeze onto the piano stool, the rain hushes for just a second, then renews itself, twice as furiously, drowning out Asriel’s voice. Frisk pulls their knees in against their chest and watches with drooping eyes as Chara gestures out the phrases, grinning in anticipation.

Frisk can’t play piano like their siblings can, not yet. Maybe it’ll all start making sense soon, the way their two hands have to work together, how hard it is to press the keys properly. Some things are just hard, but, they think, not always. Not for ever.

It took a long time for Chara and Asriel to start sitting together again, but now…

As the first few notes ring out, as clear as glass, they let their eyes fall shut. The melody muddles along to its end and then repeats, softly, accompanied by chords. A dissonant mistake. A pause. A correction. Asriel plays the counterpart phrases, a little clumsy, a little loud. Frisk doesn’t need to look to picture his fluffy four-fingered hands on the keys, reacclimating to their weight.

The tune picks up, and then ends, and then picks up again, the cautious rhythm of practice. It’s starting to sound familiar. Chara talks, unintelligible, about how it’s supposed to come together: here louder, here slowing down. Frisk can hear them smiling. A brief wind brings the rain closer, and then further away again.

As Asriel starts singing faintly, Frisk thinks maybe they should get some snacks; but the sofa is too comfortable, and they doze off.


	3. they're not bound by it, not any more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and this one was for... myself...

Chara and Frisk hold hands, gazing down at the enormous flat stone in front of them. Frisk traces the symbols etched into its surface idly, wondering what they might be for, but Chara’s fingers are cold and hard as ice around theirs. They seem distracted.

Standing on opposite sides of the rough stone, their eyes closed, are Toriel and Asriel, Toriel as still as a statue, Asriel trying his hardest to be the same. His face is perfectly serene, and his nostrils flare slightly with each slowing breath he takes. Chara looks worriedly at him, but turns, and begins to lead Frisk by the hand slowly away down the slope. Clumps of dry grass crunch here and there under their feet as they go, leaving the ritual at a safe distance.

Frisk glances over at Undyne, cooling down with Alphys in the shade of a tree whose roots jut out of the steep mountain slope. She says something and gestures with her shovel at the foggy rainforest at the base of the mountain, at the busy human city sprawled out like a busy little termite colony under the bare blue sky. Alphys laughs, and punches her on the shoulder.

But Chara’s headed somewhere else. They make a beeline towards the stone steps going down into the empty reservoir. Frisk almost stumbles, and has to pull at them to get them to slow down.

Chara looks back at them, hair ruffled into their eyes by the wind, and mutters, “Sorry.”

The depth of the reservoir is a little awe-inspiring. Frisk doesn’t let go of Chara’s hand as they approach the edge, but they do scoop up a willing pebble and give it a bit of a spin as they toss it over the cliff. Toriel wouldn’t normally let them get this close, they think, breathing deeply of the wind that blows over the edge and down into the shadowed basin.

Chara sits down, their legs dangling over the cliff. The motion yanks Frisk down a little, but they drop to their knees as gracefully and as far away from the cliff as they can.

“I’m sorry,” Chara says again, eyes downcast. The cold, wiry energy hasn’t left their fingers.

“It’s okay,” says Frisk awkwardly. They think they can guess what this is about.

“I thought I was over it.” Chara kicks their heels loudly against the rock, and the sound echoes all the way down the cliff. “He is… Az is… up there. Casting _magic_ , like he was always meant to be. And. I’m here.”

“—W-we’re here,” Frisk interjects.

“Yes,” says Chara, their voice brittle. “We are… here. Present. And… doing nothing. Inactive. Ineffectual.”

It’s been two years, but Frisk still isn’t used to having to guess what Chara is thinking. They reach out and very lightly touch Chara’s shoulder with their free hand, and lightly rub their back. Chara stays stiff, though, until the rich, resonant tones of Toriel’s voice rise beneath the bitter wind: a wordless, sonorous drone that turns the world around it into song. Asriel’s softer voice harmonises with it, carrying all the way down the mountain slope.

Frisk leans over, resting their head lightly on Chara’s shoulder. “We did… lots ‘f stuff,” they mumble. “I think maybe too much.”

“I know.”

“We got out. And so ‘d everyone.”

“Not us. Az did that.”

Frisk sighs. “Yeah. That’s what I mean. And we got out. And then… he’s happy, and everyone’s happy, and that’s how ‘t should be, because… we didn’t need to, we didn’t need to do anything. Not much. And we don’t need to now, either.”

Chara is silent after that. The wind whistles musically around them, excited by the distant ritual, and a tingle of green fire dances from Frisk’s fingers when they lift them.

“You’re right,” Chara says finally, flopping back onto the dirt, so that Frisk almost falls over on top of them. “It doesn’t matter. They’re fine. I’m just—still—bored.”

Their grip on Frisk’s hand relaxes, at last.

Frisk doesn’t let go. They lean in low, so that their face is right between Chara’s and the sun and their shadow falls on Chara’s eyes, and whisper, “I spy, with my little eye—”

Chara groans so loudly that their face goes red. “ _Stop_.”

It’s the funniest thing in the world when they do that, of course, and Frisk grins in the way Chara likes to call “haunting” and “perjurous” and “absolutely unjustified”. But before they can quite say that, the wind stops.

Toriel’s voice, and Asriel’s voice, carry on unhalting for a few seconds, and the sun grows warm on Frisk’s back, and then finally, the third voice joins them—the great rock’s gravelly hum, which Frisk can still feel through their knees despite how far away they are. Sparks crackle from Frisk’s fingers as they push themself to their feet, and Chara is soon to follow; and then they both see the rock shoot up into the air with a faint _boom_ on a tremendous geyser of white steam.

Faintly in the distance, Asriel whoops.

Chara and Frisk share a little look, and begin picking their way up the slope as the steam cloud, still growing, passes overhead in a roiling mass and takes shape over the reservoir. The air grows thick, and hot, and dark with fog, and it’s not long before they hear footsteps pattering down towards them.

Asriel slams into Frisk—or it feels like that at first, but he catches their hands up in his, his claws dig into their fingers as he dances around them and he is talking—”Did you see that? Did you see how much we brought up? We did that! I really felt it, I swear, we went all the way down into the wellspring and it spoke to us and _fwoosh_!”

He’s laughing around his words; his eyes are as wide and bright as two red poppies; magic radiates from him like a blanket of warm dew. Frisk finds themself mimicking his smile, and they toss him up into the air a little (he is still so light), and catch him, and pull him into the tightest possible hug.

When they look up the shape of Toriel has resolved, light-footed and looming, out of the vapour. She beams at them, at Chara’s arm wrapping around Frisk’s shoulders. “Children—I am glad to announce our new village will soon have water. You’ve all done very well today; and I’m proud of you, Asriel.”

Then, with an inclination of her head: “Why don’t you tell Undyne and Alphys about what you’ve done?”

“Oh—oh, yes!” Asriel wriggles free of Frisk and Chara’s grip and immediately dashes off, calling Undyne’s name. After a moment, Frisk thinks they can just hear Undyne shouting her own name back.

“I hope you are not too tired from staying out all day, children,” Toriel says, turning towards the basin where the cloud has settled. The fog finally pulls away, funnelling into a solid white mass of vapour, egg-shaped, that hovers high in the bare blue sky; the rock is a distant dot seated on its crown, from where crowds of rainbows arc down. “The magic is not yet done—but it will be, soon. From this lake we will drink water touched by sunlight, and we will grow rice, bananas, pomegranates… Please follow me—Asriel, you will not want to miss this!”

She begins to walk down towards the basin, and Chara and Frisk thoughtlessly join hands to follow. But Frisk briefly touches their free fingers to the centre of their chest, to the little locket saying “BFF” that Chara and Asriel bought for them last year, remembering the shape of it.

“I really think,” Frisk starts to say then, and Chara picks up the sentence, as if they were still thinking the same words in the same head, not arguing, not explaining, just affirming what they both already know—"I think we’re going to be okay.“


End file.
